Re:Relativistic Spaceship
by pantalaimon on Monday February 05, 2024 @06:25PM
(#39268621)
Imagine a generation ship, consuming the energy of an entire star for the trip.
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Re:Relativistic Spaceship
by actionfromafar on Monday February 05, 2024 @06:39PM
(#39268742)
We have one of those (stars)!
Just need to build a parabolic reflector on one side of it and point it towards the opposite direction where we want to go. When the reflector shoots to far from the same, tilt the reflectors, drop down closer to the Sun by gravity, tilt them back, do it again.
We could be going places in a few billion years!
Yes. And that's not the only way to make this work.
Btw, the sun is also an extremely inefficient engine. With a bit of extra engineering we could probably scoop up hydrogen from the sun, and 'burn' it much more efficiently.
Fun thought, we’re kind of all on one right now! Regardless of how you choose to define “human,” we’ve been around for much less time than a single revolution around the Milky Way. We get no say in the route, and our star is feeding us rather than fueling our travel, but still a wild thought.